Is Life Strange
by Cat the Alien
Summary: "Pictures are tangible memories..." a friend once said. "It never has to be perfect...but the emotion is still there." A story of time travel, polaroids and human connection.


**Is Life Strange...**

Chapter One

* * *

Along time ago I had a friend named Devon. We went to the same High School and had the same Chemistry class together. I never noticed him before until we first met. In fact, I never had seen him around town, ever. Arcadia Bay was a small place; closed doors were protective as thin-sheets of lined paper. Yet he managed to evade, hid himself away and became an invisible man—only to pop-up under my radar; hair blown by a tornado and asked, "You want to be partners for this project?"

"Yes." I spoke—we dived straight to work. Hypothesize, plan, research and experiment; we ended up with a plain 'B' as a result. He shrugged, turned and went back to his seat at the far end of the room. A part of me was disappointed that our partnership—though fleeting—just ended like that. Class ended later and he asked if I wanted to grab lunch with him.

We devoured sandwiches and drained milk cartons at the steps of Blackwell Academy. Our eyes aimed towards the distance where the sky lined with the sea. The weather was perfect; wind nice and calm.

Out of the blue, Devon gave me a question. "Do you want to be friends?"

-X-

Devon was average at best. Possibly a bit lanky. The shirts were too big and pants too small—mismatched socks peeked out from a pair of navy New Balance's worn out from an eternal long trek with the concrete jungle; he reminded me of a small child that had been stretched upwards for a very long time. His face—on the other-hand—made him looked like he won the million-dollar prize in a genetic lottery.

I could've written off my attraction towards Devon as a silly school boy crush. I suppose. His physical appearance alone gravitated me towards the darkest depths of unknown territory. No aim but to wonder; observe as Devon passively guided me to safety. Our connection should've been non-existent not on the cliched basis, 'lack of chemistry'. He was out of my depth and out of my league as one of the stars in a metaphorical heaven.

And yet there we were; two guys on the stairs to Blackwell Academy. He wasn't a far-distant star; I wasn't a lone wanderer. It made me feel I'd finally found somebody I could simply 'get'. Although our friendship did last for a very long time beyond the boundaries of High School years, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

-X-

It was the spring of 2007 and we were in Devon's room.

Our backs on the carpeted floor; minds occupied with thoughts of just being; Devon's hands were holding an old Polaroid camera while I had a Sony Walkman in mine. We had an earbud stuck into one of our ears— _Walk On The Wild Side_ by Velvet Underground strummed along the background as we did an impromptu selfie.

"Why do you take pictures?" I'd asked.

"Why do you make mix-tapes?" Devon replied back. I watched him take interest with the image printed out, dropping the conservation entirely into a flat silence while he waved it in the air. However the curiosity still persisted and gnawed into my conscious. I peered towards the picture as one would stare at face-to-face with a tiger at the zoo.

"Looks blurred," I spoke. "All your picture seemed to by like that, you know. So why take those kind of pictures?"

"For the memories." He replied; simple and short. "I could always make up the answer and say perfectionism is overrated. However..." He said a few minutes later. "There's no nostalgia in absolute perfection. Or maybe it's perfection as a whole."

He turned to his side, propped one arm to support his head and tilted downwards until our eyes were aligned.

"Pictures are memories I can touch. There are memories that I could remember clearly, there are memories I couldn't remember except as blurred shapes. I suppose the human mind is flawed really—we all want to believe what's true to us, hence we blurred the memories that would hurt the most...but that would just make the feeling intense."

He leaned in towards me until the tips of ours noses touched.

"You've got a very pointy nose." He stated half an hour later, "An eye might get poked."

"Never happened to me." I replied.

We kissed.

-X-

At that moment, I realised two things about Devon. First, there were no sparks between the two of us; second was the familiarity of the situation. Then again, to say it was _deja vu_ would be cliche as _we are meant to be_. Left alone, I could lie myself...his kiss is how I imagined. Yet something deep, deep, deep in my mind started to stir; akin to being prodded by the end of a very-long, pointy stick. More so of a urge than an annoyance for the sake of provoke; I didn't paid any attention towards that particular feeling then. However when I got out of his room and walked back to mine, everything just hit me.

There's very little to say what I had felt...my entire existence was grabbed, scrunched and forcibly ripped into chunks. One hand managed to ease me to a wall as eyelids clenched shut. But the pain kept on coming—one hit stronger after the other.

And amidst the mental blitz, as I peered into the dark, vivid visions of events blurred past me. Voices roared and saturated in my ears. I hear a woman's scream and metal being torn. My skin went cold and I became numb. Everything just stop—silent.

Next I would've found myself in the nurse's office with a light-head and heavy limbs. It took all my energy to prop myself against headboard, but the action made the world spin. I'd wasted five or so minutes in futile attempt to stabilise my head. On my right was a black, rectangular clock stood on a cheap looking night-stand sourced from IKEA. The time displayed bright red light was 7:01 p.m.

-X-

Devon came into the room fifteen minutes later with a box of orange juice and an Oreo packet in hand. He left them on the table, looked at me, made around the bed and sat on a chair on my left. It took him twenty minutes later to fully realise I was awake. Whilst I had crumb spilt over myself and attempted to tear open the box of orange juice he gave, Devon sat on my bed and rested his thumb at the corner of my lips. Carefully flicking away crumbs off my face; he wore a vacant expression as he looked to me. He seemed rather conflicted.

"I shouldn't have done it..."

"Done what?"

He kissed me once more.

"I'm a selfish person."

"So am I."

I leaned in for the kiss this time.

He broke off after a minute later and looked away. The adrenaline in him began to fade. Devon closed his eyes and heaved out a sigh. Dread hovered in the air as the both of us lingered in silence.

"To be honest, I like you," he began. "I'm attracted to you and I want to be with you, but our relationship only ends as friends. Not out of shame...I just can't forgive myself. If kissing you is our version of having an oral, then I don't know what sleeping with you would be like. Great possibly; I'll be floating on cloud nine. I know...sounds romantic...That's where I stop."

He tears open the box and hands it back to me.

"You're a somebody, Cyrus. That's means something. You wait for me when I don't need company and stick around long enough till I'm bored and buried eight-feet underneath the ground. And for a change, the third floor bathrooms had re-opened since the first-day of school six months ago. But you won't be able to use them until morning 'cause the nurse said so."

He paused. Took an Oreo out from the packet. Ate, chewed and swallowed in one fluid motion.

"Although I see no point of sticking around," He spoke. "There are better places to waste your time."

He wiped off crumbs from his face with the back of his hand. Rubbed it against his jeans. Ruffled my hair and left. His presence stayed an hour or so until I decided to myself, "Maybe I should check out the showers...better than doing nothing, I guess."

I emptied the carton and pillaged the packet of Oreos, leaving two empty shells in a waste basket near the nurse's desk. I'd written a note on her board saying I'm okay and will check back in the morning. Got out. Made back to my room. Grabbed a towel, bottle of soap and headed towards the showers.

There was nobody in the room when I arrived. The tiles were dry and shone like newly whitened teeth underneath the florescent lights. Sink faucets were buttery smooth as I twisted them. I stripped myself naked, folded my clothes and hid them away in the furthest corner incase some schmuck decided it would be funny to play a practical joke on me.

The water was cold to my bones as water pour on my head; beating against my with a sound that reminded me of an out-of-tune snare drum. It gradually became warmer and water until steam started to obscure my vision. It could be somewhat profound really, when I think about it. To exist seem almost irrelevant as 'things' I had never noticed before slowly melted away. Enlightenment.

-X-

. _..And we kept falling...falling...falling. The wind screamed at me. My body bolted to an airline seat. Her nails dug into my skin...blood matched the paint she wore._

 _There was a teddy bear floating in mid-air...one button eye lost. It belong to a girl...Emma I believe...she asked me to take a picture some time ago. Her screams were louder than the wind itself...or maybe that's just how death talks._

 _Somehow as we get closer and closer to the darkness...a part of myself is in peace..._

 _...dead for a long time...it's a possibility...where I left my heart doesn't really matter anyways..._

 _Just breath in...and out...breath in...and out..._

 _...Hey Devon...I love you..._


End file.
